CVE-2026-43468

MEDIUM

net/mlx5: Fix deadlock between devlink lock and esw->wq

Title source: cna
STIX 2.1

Description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: net/mlx5: Fix deadlock between devlink lock and esw->wq esw->work_queue executes esw_functions_changed_event_handler -> esw_vfs_changed_event_handler and acquires the devlink lock. .eswitch_mode_set (acquires devlink lock in devlink_nl_pre_doit) -> mlx5_devlink_eswitch_mode_set -> mlx5_eswitch_disable_locked -> mlx5_eswitch_event_handler_unregister -> flush_workqueue deadlocks when esw_vfs_changed_event_handler executes. Fix that by no longer flushing the work to avoid the deadlock, and using a generation counter to keep track of work relevance. This avoids an old handler manipulating an esw that has undergone one or more mode changes: - the counter is incremented in mlx5_eswitch_event_handler_unregister. - the counter is read and passed to the ephemeral mlx5_host_work struct. - the work handler takes the devlink lock and bails out if the current generation is different than the one it was scheduled to operate on. - mlx5_eswitch_cleanup does the final draining before destroying the wq. No longer flushing the workqueue has the side effect of maybe no longer cancelling pending vport_change_handler work items, but that's ok since those are disabled elsewhere: - mlx5_eswitch_disable_locked disables the vport eq notifier. - mlx5_esw_vport_disable disarms the HW EQ notification and marks vport->enabled under state_lock to false to prevent pending vport handler from doing anything. - mlx5_eswitch_cleanup destroys the workqueue and makes sure all events are disabled/finished.

Scores

CVSS v3 5.5
EPSS 0.0001
EPSS Percentile 1.8%
Attack Vector LOCAL
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

Details

CWE
CWE-667
Status published
Products (16)
Linux/Linux < 6.0
Linux/Linux 6.0
Linux/Linux 6.1.167 - 6.1.*
Linux/Linux 6.12.78 - 6.12.*
Linux/Linux 6.18.19 - 6.18.*
Linux/Linux 6.19.9 - 6.19.*
Linux/Linux 6.6.130 - 6.6.*
Linux/Linux 7.0
Linux/Linux f1bc646c9a06f09aad5d8bacb87103b5573ee45e - 0de867f6e34eae6907b367fd152c55e61cb98608
Linux/Linux f1bc646c9a06f09aad5d8bacb87103b5573ee45e - 3c7313cb41b1b427078440364d2f042c276a1c0b
... and 6 more
Published May 08, 2026
Tracked Since May 08, 2026